Thirteen Previously Unpublished Letters of Ayn Rand

When Letters of Ayn Rand was published by Penguin in 1995, I made it clear in my preface that these were not the only letters of Ayn Rand, that there were, in fact, hundreds more in the Ayn Rand Archives that were omitted for numerous reasons, such as repetition or, as in the case of the many routine business letters, lack of special interest.

What I didn’t anticipate was that additional interesting letters would come to light, but such has been the case over the past twenty-two years. The sources of these “new” letters below are varied: discovered by researchers in the collections of other institutions, sent to the archives by the recipients, found folded inside other materials in the Ayn Rand papers, and some, I must admit, simply overlooked by me.

In his introduction to the Letters book in 1995, Leonard Peikoff wrote that he now had a follow-up answer when people ask him, “What was [Ayn Rand] really like?” Previously, he would advise reading her novels, but now he could also advise: “Read her letters.” I hope that these additions to her published letters will reveal even more about what Ayn Rand was really like. —Michael Berliner.

To Sarah Lipton, one of the Chicago relatives with whom Ayn Rand lived upon her arrival from Russia in 1926

November 27, 1932

Dear Mrs. Lipton:

I was very, very happy to hear from you. Please forgive me for delaying my answer for such a long time. I have lots to tell you.

I have written to Mrs. Stone [another Chicago relative] several times, but I did not get any answer. I do hope the family isn’t angry at me for something. I hope you don’t think I am terribly ungrateful. I have not forgotten all that the family has done for me—nor will I ever forget it. I also remember that I owe a big debt—and I think I’ll soon be able to begin to repay it. I think—and hope—that I’m going to get on my feet now.

I’ve had a pretty hard time. However, I shouldn’t complain, for I have had a job all through this depression. That newspaper article you sent me just about covers all the essential news about me—except that they didn’t get straight the story about how I met Cecil DeMille. They had that wrong. But I did work in the wardrobe at RKO—for over three years. It was not a bad job—not sewing (for I still can’t sew a stitch), but in the wardrobe office. I wasn’t getting very much money—but enough to carry on. The work was quite hard—nerve wracking—a lot of details, a lot of rushes, excitement, and—quite frequently—a lot of overtime. Besides, I had to keep house—try to cook, and wash dishes, and such—at night. But I simply could not give up writing. I came to America to write—and I had not forgotten that. That’s something I’ll never give up. But it was pretty much of a problem—I didn’t have very much time to write and when I did find an hour or two at night, I was so tired that I could hardly get any ideas, my head felt too heavy—and one can’t do one’s best work after hours and hours in a studio wardrobe (the messiest department of a studio). Sometimes, I got up at 5:30 or 6 a.m.—to write a few hours before going to work. All this time I’ve been working on a novel—a real big novel I want to write—about Russia. But I found that advancing as slowly as I did—it would have taken me too long to complete a novel. So—last spring—I wrote two scenarios. I want to try and sell them—and get enough money to live without working for a while—and finish the novel.

You know how hard it is to sell an original story—especially for an unknown writer—and especially since the talkies. I was lucky enough to get a very prominent firm of agents [Myron Selznick] interested in the stories. They liked them, agreed to handle them and—sold one of them—“Red Pawn.” It’s a story about Russia—and I always have the advantage of saying that I know the subject. All the studios here were interested in Russian stories, but have had trouble finding any, so that helped me.

Universal bought the story for their star Tala Birell, and signed me on a two-months contract—to write the adaptation or treatment of the story. I did the treatment and also the continuity, that is, the final, shooting script. And I am happy to say that they are very pleased. Right now, they are looking for a director for my story, that is, they have not selected one, yet. As soon as they do, the story will go into production—and I do hope it won’t be long.

My contract expired, but they liked my work so well, evidently, that they kept me on and gave me another assignment. I have to do the continuity or screen play for a story of theirs, called “Black Pearls.” It is a picture of the South Seas. Several writers have tried to adapt it, but the studio was not satisfied. It’s quite a difficult story to adapt. Now, I’ve got it. I had quite a few headaches over it, but I think I’ve solved the difficulty. At least, I outlined my idea to the supervisor and he liked it very much. So now I’m writing the script and I hope they’ll like it.

I have not signed another contract, yet—am waiting to see what they’ll do about my “Red Pawn.” If it goes over—I’ll, probably, get a good contract. As a beginner, I’m not getting very much money at present, but it’s more than in the wardrobe and it was worth taking to get a start.

Of course, I don’t have to tell you how thrilled and happy I am over it all. I was beginning to think that all my friends will lose all faith in me. It has taken me quite a long time. But I hope that the most difficult part of the struggle is over, now. Such is my “professional” life. As to my home life—I am still as happy as ever—even happier if such a thing is possible. Frank is simply wonderful. I wish you could meet him. I do hope I’ll see you before many more years pass. If I ever get established as a real writer—I’ll take a trip back east. And how about yourself? Do you ever contemplate another visit to California?

By the way, if you’re curious about Frank, you can see him in a picture called Three on a Match. He has just the tiniest bit in it—but it’s a good, long closeup of him. It’s along towards the beginning of the picture, there are a series of news flashes there and you’ll see the closeup of a man listening in on a radio—with old-fashioned ear-phones on, or whatever you call them, you know, a radio apparatus that you put on your ears to listen in. Well, that’s Frank. If you happen to see the picture, take a look at my husband. . . .

I am waiting for a nice long letter from you with all the news about the family. How is everybody? How are the children? They must be all grown up now.

I’ll close this long letter, before you get tired of reading my terrible handwriting.

Please give my love to Mr. and Mrs. Stone, Mr. Lipton, Bee and everybody in the family. And please give me Mrs. Stone’s address, I would like to write to her.

I thank you very, very much for still remembering me—and I hope to hear from you soon.

Lots of love—

To Sinclair Lewis, American novelist and playwright

This undated letter to Sinclair Lewis exists only in handwritten form. It is not known if Ayn Rand ever sent it to Lewis, and the relevant Lewis papers were lost in a 1989 fire. She later met Lewis backstage after a performance of one of his plays and received from him an inscribed (with “Love”) copy of It Can’t Happen Here.

Dear Mr. Lewis,

Being a writer—and the greatest one living—you may understand me when I say that the most important things, the most real ones, and particularly, the most sacred are the hardest ones to express. After so many years of so much that I would like to say to you I find that I can say nothing. I would like to say that you are the last hope in a revolting, pointless mess called literature, the only living mind I’ve heard, the best god of the very religious atheist that I am, the best hero of an embittered and incurable hero worshipper who believes in nothing on earth expect heroes. But all this sounds like pretty loud flattery—and there is no other way of saying it. I cannot give my words the strength they need—the certainty that I mean every one of them. I can say it. I can’t prove it. I can only hope that perhaps you will believe it.

I know also that the mere fact of my trying to say it to you is presumptuous, since you have heard all this before, and more of it, and you must be very tired of hearing it. That I have wanted so much to say it, for such a long time, and it means so much to me, that I am saying (1) even taking the chance that you will not understand it as I mean it or (2) understanding it, will not care. I cannot expect you to care. But I do know that if, at the height of my own career, I could find one person to whom my work meant as much as yours does to me, I would like to know it.

I cannot tell you here all that I think of It Can’t Happen Here. If there is an author I like, besides yourself, it’s Berzelius Windrip and his “Zero Hour.” I have never read anything that approaches for sheer genius those little quotations at the head of your chapters, that gives one, quicker and clearer than any political dissertations, the very essence of modern mob spirit. As one of the millions who owe you a profound gratitude for this book, I would like to thank you for writing it.

Please forgive me if this letter seems a little melodramatic to you. But I cannot help feeling that everything deeply felt has to be a little melodramatic, simply because it isn’t being done as a rule. And I must thank you—as deeply and melodramatically as I can—for the book you gave me—and for your inscription. I shall try to live up to it someday.

Gratefully,

P.S. I do not lose my heroworship very easily—if at all.

To Melville Cane, Ayn Rand’s attorney and an award-winning poet

February 15, 1936

Dear Mr. Cane:

My deepest gratitude for your book and still more for the rare pleasure your poems have given me. I do not know whether you will understand me when I say that I love poetry so much that I never read it. I think that poetry is the highest and most exacting of arts, therefore it should be perfect—or nothing. And it is perfect so seldom. But your work is perfect and I appreciate profoundly the privilege you have given me of reading it.

There is one verse in particular which I would like, presumptuously perhaps, to see used as my epitaph some day. No, I won’t tell you which one.¹ Presumptuously again, I hope that you may try to guess it. You will probably see through it, so I may as well confess that it is a feminine legal trick to leave myself an opening for an opportunity to see you and tell you in person how much I admire your work.

Since the book was sent to me from my lawyer when he isn’t a lawyer, I will not attempt here to thank you for your help in matters that were anything but poetic. But I do thank you for your work in the realm that is so far above courtrooms and arbitrations.²

Sincerely,

To James Cleary, the court-appointed arbiter in the case Rand brought against A. W. Woods, producer of Night of January 16th on Broadway

April 8, 1936

Dear Mr. Cleary,

This is only a very inadequate way of expressing my profound gratitude to you for your help, understanding and sense of justice. I must admit that I was quite frightened when I faced the arbitration, not only because of what was involved, but because it was my first encounter with law and I felt that, should I lose, I would also lose all faith in justice and carry a sense of bitterness throughout the rest of my life. You have spared me this, and nothing I can say will ever express all my gratitude to you.

Since my novel We the Living is the thing most precious to me and the only achievement of which I can feel proud, I am taking the liberty of sending it to you as a token of my deepest appreciation. Perhaps it will help you to forget that I ever wrote Night of January 16, which, in its present form, I can hardly consider a credit to any reputation I may have as a writer. And I would like you to remember me as something more than the author of what had once been a good play.

Thanking you again for your kindness, firmness, and patience, I am

Gratefully yours,

To Abe and Sarah Satrin (formerly Sarah Lipton)

June 4, 1936

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Satrin:

I hope you’ll excuse me for my long silence again, but Mr. Satrin knows how busy I am here and I feel you’ll forgive me. What Mr. Satrin has seen here is nothing compared to how busy I’ve been lately, since he left. It’s been nothing but appointments, interviews, public-speech-making and so on. I enjoy it all a lot, but it does take all my time.

First of all, I want to thank Mrs. Satrin for liking my book.³ I was very happy to hear all the nice things you said about it in your last letter. And I am glad to think that you believe the book justifies all the trouble you’ve had in bringing me to this country and in keeping me here. I often think of this, but the book is only my beginning. From now on, I think it will be easier and you won’t have to wait ten years to hear of my success.

I was shocked and terribly sorry to hear of Mr. Satrin’s troubles on the way to Chicago and then of the accident in Chicago on top of it all. The only thing I can say is that I’m glad you were not hurt, it could have been much worse. I hope that this will be the end of such bad luck for you and that things will turn for the better from now on.

Frank and I miss Mr. Satrin very much. I still hope that perhaps we will all meet again in California this winter.

Two letters to Marcella Rabwin, a neighbor of Ayn Rand’s at an apartment building across the street from RKO, where they both worked in 1929–1932

Rabwin (then Bannett) was instrumental in two of Rand’s works: the story “Red Pawn,” which, Rabwin relates elsewhere, she persuaded an agent friend of hers to sell, enabling Rand to quit her wardrobe job at RKO and write full-time; and The Fountainhead, whose theme and the character of second-hander Peter Keating were inspired by a comment Rabwin made about wanting a car only if others didn’t have one.

February 12, 1937

Dear Marcella,

I can’t tell you how grateful I am for your “review” of my book. I appreciate deeply not only your kind opinion of it, but also the fact that you let me know about it. I am very, very happy to know that you liked it so much, and your letter gives me a great encouragement for the future.

I must only reprimand you for saying that your opinion at this late stage can’t have any “importance for me.” You know that I have valued your opinion very highly always. Besides, I have not forgotten that you have, in a way, “discovered” me, in helping me to sell my first story “Red Pawn.” I will always be grateful to you for that, and if you like my work, it makes me very happy to think that I have justified your interest in me at the very beginning of my “career” when I had never sold a single story.

If you like the background of We the Living, you must realize why I hate Soviet Russia and why I have always been rather violent on that subject. You can see what I have lived through. Of course, the story and plot of the book are purely fictional. (It is not my autobiography, as some reviewers thought.) But the background and living conditions are all true, as I have seen them. In fact, when people ask me whether things in Russia are really as bad as I described them, I always say, no, they are not as bad, they’re much worse. I did have to tone down on the background—to make the book readable at all.

No, you didn’t “injure my first born” when you compared the book to January 16th. I know there can be no comparison between them. Personally, I think January 16th is a piece of trash, particularly after Al Woods got through with it. I never thought much of the play when compared to the book. I really did work on the book, to the best of my ability. The play—I wrote in two months. It made money—that’s all I can say for it. And I hope it will be forgotten. It’s not the kind of writing I want to be known by.

As to your questions: do I ever think of you? Of course, I do. I heard from Mrs. Eppes [Rabwin’s mother] a few weeks ago and I wrote to her shortly before I received your letter. I miss you a great deal and I am getting to be very homesick for Hollywood. But as to when I’ll be able to come back—I don’t know at all. There is too much business holding me here. I have recently finished the dramatization of We the Living for a producer who read the book and wants to do it on the stage. It will be done on Broadway early in the fall, so I have to stay here until then. Also, I’ve gone slightly crazy and entered the producing field myself. I’ve taken an option on a play [“Comes the Revolution”] by an unknown young author [Walter Abbott], and I’m going to produce it, if I can get the proper backing. I have never had any desire to be a producer, but this play is a work of genius and I think I’ve discovered a great writer. I’d like to help him, and if all goes well, I’ll have his play on Broadway by September.

There are many other things that have held me tied to New York. We the Living just came out in England, got very good reviews. I wanted to go there for its appearance, but all the theatrical business is here. Between times, I’m working slowly on a new novel. No, not about Russia. There will be no single Russian or Communist in it. Strictly about America and New York. I feel very enthusiastic about this new undertaking, but it will be a long and difficult one. Next fall, I do hope to be able to come back and get a Hollywood job. I love New York, but it’s nerve-wrecking [sic].

Frank has been working in summer theaters here. Incidentally, he played “Guts” Regan in January 16th in summer stock, did it very well. I’m keeping him for a part in my new play on Broadway. We thought we could make it this season, but it is too late now.

As to my family, I am trying to arrange for them to come here, but it is a long, difficult process, there are many formalities to go through in order to get a passport. Now it is my turn to ask questions. Do you plan to go away permanently to South America? You mention it in passing in your letter. And have you given up the studios for good? If you have, I think the studios lost a grand executive, but I am happy for you if you can get a rest, which you always needed, and I’m glad to know that you’re happy in your marriage. If you come to New York in June, I certainly hope that you’ll have time to call on me. I would like so much to see you again.

Frank joins me in our best wishes to you and your husband.

Once more, many, many thanks to you—

Affectionately,

***

October 14, 1937

Dear Marcella:

I was delighted to hear from you and to know that you haven’t forgotten me. You say that you have been in the midst of furnishing a house, and I am precisely in the same position right now. I have spent the summer in Connecticut and have just moved back to New York. We have taken an unfurnished apartment and are now driven mad with problems of furniture, of which we have two beds and a table at the present moment. But the rest is coming, and, so far, we are very pleased with our new place. It seems much nicer than the furnished apartments one can get in New York.

It looks as if we’ll stay here for some time to come. There are no immediate prospects for our return to Hollywood, and I have two plays on my hands, which, if all goes well, may be produced this season. One is a new play [“Ideal”] I finished this summer. The other—my adaptation of We the Living. You ask me about its production. Well, Jerome Mayer, who had it, has dropped his option on it recently, and for a very sad reason: he is afraid of producing an anti-Soviet play. When taking the option, he had assured me that he was not afraid of it, but he has a great many Red friends and they got the best of him. I am somewhat indignant about it, because it appears as if the Reds have established a nice little unofficial censorship of their own, and it is very hard to get ahead with anything anti-Communistic. But we shall see what we shall see. Right now, I have a very big producer interested in the play and expect to hear from him definitely within the week. If the politics do not stop him, he would be much better for the play than Jerome Mayer could have been.

This, then, is an account of my activities. But how about you? You mention in your letter that you are working in the daytime, but you do not say where and how etc. I notice by the letter head that you must be back with Selznick International. What are you doing now? How do you like it? I would like to know, for I am rather glad to hear that you are back at work. I have always felt that you were too good an executive to retire from the picture business.

Frank joins me in sending our best regards to your husband and to Mrs. Eppes. Our love to you always.

To Walter Abbott, a playwright and young friend of Rand’s

Dear Mr. Abbott,

Thank you for the clipping about Night of Jan. 16th. I was very glad to receive it from you, because it shows that you know I haven’t forgotten you, in spite of my long silence. At least, I hope you do. Ever since your last letter, way back this summer, I have been trying to do something about getting some pull to get for you one of those scholarships you mentioned, or some form of scholar­ship, but I haven’t had any luck. I’m afraid my pulls are not so good, and I’m not so good at getting any.

I have been hoping to hear that someone has had the good sense to produce “A Better Day,” but I am really beginning to think that people either have good taste or money. They don’t come with both any more, in this damned century. I also had another hope, but nothing has come of it: I thought that if We the Living were produced, I would have enough money of my own, to do your play, if it were still available. You see, I am both optimistic and conceited. And I still think that “A Better Day” is the best play I have ever read in English, my own and everybody else’s dramas included. But I’m still sitting and waiting—for a better day, literally and figuratively. We the Living has not been done yet (troubles both casting and political). There is a good chance of its going on next season. But you can see for yourself how uncertain everything is on Broadway. So I can do nothing but wait and hope.

And I HOPE that you have NOT seen Night of Jan. 16th in Cleveland. I think I’ve told you how ashamed I am of the damn thing. In the first place, it was mutilated by Woods here, so that the New York production script was bad enough. But what is worse, I understand that in Cleveland they used not the Broadway but the amateur version of the play. And that is something to blush about and to crawl under the waste basket. It was “edited” by the publishers, Longmans Green, to suit the demands of the church and school acting groups. It was censored and “cleaned up” and castrated. If, God forbid, you saw it, you can’t even know what’s mine in it and what is everybody else’s. And collective creation never creates anything except a shameful mess. The jury gag and a vague outline of the plot in general is about all that is left in the amateur version from what the play really was. So, if you saw it, don’t hold it against me. Forgive and forget.

What are you doing now? What has happened to the play on married life that you mentioned writing this summer? I am sorry to hear that you are trying to go commercial, you who have so much real talent, but I can’t take it upon myself to blame you, in view of the reception you got on your magnificent work and in view of the trash that is being produced every day here. They flop, they close one after the other, but there is always more coming. The public doesn’t want it, but it seems that that’s what the producers want. I’ll have to lose thousands out of my own pocket before I will be convinced that there is no audience for a play like yours. And even then I won’t be convinced. Oh, to hell with them all! Our day will come yet. Then we’ll have the pleasure of telling all the B. . . s “we told you so.”

But don’t go commercial more than once, if you have to. Have you done any real work? Have you any prospects of coming to New York? Or is it still a question of a job?

I do want to hear from you. Don’t hold my long silences against me. I’m one of those writers that have a horror of writing letters. When I’m working I just can’t coordinate my ideas on anything else, such as writing a coherent letter. Not that I don’t want to, I try, but I give up. Then I take time off from work and concentrate on letters. I’m a one track mind. Then all my friends hear from me at once. If you can understand and tolerate such a system, let me hear from you, when you can. I won’t always be such an unreliable correspondent about answering.

I have been very busy this summer and ever since. Finished a new play—no news on that so far. Finished a novelette—a short novel—and sold it already in England. It will come out there this spring. Now I’m working on a new novel, a tremendous one, about 400,000 words long and taking in a span of fifteen years, I judge. It’s about American architects. I spent over two months this winter, working as a typist in an architect’s office, without salary, for the experience. Got great material, too.

Frank asks me specially to say hello to you for him and to send you his best regards. My ex-partner Albert [Mannheimer] is in Hollywood, got himself signed on a long term writing contract.

With all my best wishes,

Sincerely

To Ann Watkins, Ayn Rand’s agent

May 17, 1941

Dear Ann:

This is in answer to your letter of May 13th. I am afraid that our present situation is the kind of thing that happens when one allows others to step into a deal of which they are not an essential part. I find it simply impossible to deal with Miss Sorsby—and so we must clarify our position personally between you and me.

First, let me re-state in writing our conversation and agreement made verbally on April 21st. You remember that I asked you then for a written confirmation and you assured me that it was not necessary between us, since both of us would live up to our word. I still believe this of both of us. So I record our conversation to keep our agreement completely clear.

It was not, as you state in your letter, my request that you discontinue to represent me in the placing of my play. I intended to do that, of course, but when I came into your office—it was you who started the conversation by saying that you thought it would be best if I handled the play myself. So, it would be fairer to say that we terminated our deal by mutual agreement—and not by a one-sided desire on your part or mine, with the first suggestion coming from you. Then you said that you wished nothing but to help me sell this play and that anything I did to sell it would be most welcome to you; that you had no desire to make any difficulties or claims; in short, that you were turning the play over to me completely. Then, it was I who mentioned the Paramount deal and said that should my new agent find a producer who wished to use Paramount backing and should Paramount give him the partial backing you said they had promised—my new agent would give you 2½ per cent of the agency commission. I made this offer myself, voluntarily, without your request and not by way of bargaining. I felt that if the Paramount deal was a concrete, definite deal negotiated by you and if it helped the sale of the play to a producer—the new agent should give you a share, although, of course, you know that an author pays a commission only on the sale of a play to a producer, not on the finding of a backer; an author has nothing to do with the financial backing of a play and no commission for financing is ever paid to an author. You did not ask me for this offer—I made it myself. And you accepted. You said that you had always found me fair and honest in financial matters—and such was our agreement on the play.

Now, as to my novel [The Fountainhead], I had no desire or intention to take that away from you. I wanted to have you continue as my agent on the novel, because it was being handled personally by you and Margot [Johnson]—and I had confidence in both of you. I did not hold against you in any way the fact that the novel had not yet been sold—because I knew you had both done your best and I realize the difficulties connected with that novel perhaps even better than you do. But when I asked you whether you wished to continue with the novel, you told me you did not. You said that you did not want to handle the novel further because I made it impossible for you to sell it. When I asked “Why?” you answered—here are your exact words, Ann, I remember them because they made a deep impression on me and I’ll remember them all my life—“Why? Why? You always ask me why. I can’t answer you. I don’t go by reasons, I act upon instinct.” That, Ann, was the epitaph on our relations. There was nothing I could say after that. Words are an instrument of reason, and instincts are unanswerable. So our interview ended right there, and this was our understanding on the novel. You added only that you wished to continue to represent Night of January 16th and such rights in my other things as you had sold.

This, then, is a complete account of our conversation and agreement. You will not find one statement in it which is incorrect in any way, if you carefully recall the conversation yourself.

Since then I sent you a formal letter stating the terms of our agreement. I believe you resented the fact that I did not mention the 2½ per cent in [the] case of the Paramount deal. I did not mention it, because that was not a condition of our agreement. The agreement was that the play returns to me completely. The 2½ per cent was my own offer—subject to the new agent finding a producer who wished to use the Paramount deal. Since then, I have found that there is no Paramount deal; that is, when the new agent found a producer who was interested and who approached Paramount—the studio said that they had not committed themselves at all, that they would only send a script of the play to the West Coast and that they would probably agree to furnish half the backing. So none of us knows at present how this will come out and whether there even will be any Paramount deal to discuss. It is possible that we are disagreeing over nothing. My point at present is only that legally you have returned my play to me without any further claims upon it by you. I made no agreement with my new agent until after I had spoken to you on April 21st. Then I made the agreement with her on the basis of my agreement with you. And that is the agreement by which we all must abide now in all fairness.

I do not doubt your honesty in this matter. But what I do resent is that Miss Sorsby then tried to step in by telephoning me several times and by taking the attitude that she had to bargain with me over terms, particularly over the Paramount deal. I had never dealt before with Miss Sorsby personally and I had never even considered her as my agent on the play. YOU were my agent, and any connection she had with the play was only as your representative or assistant, not mine. I resented—violently and emphatically—her attempt to bargain with me the last time she telephoned me. When I stated to her that you and I had already reached a definite agreement, she took the position which amounted to calling me a liar, an attitude of “well, it’s your word against mine.” Do you see what happens when a third party steps in? I don’t know what she thought or why, but I think it was simply a matter of the kind of mess that happens when conversations have to be held in a three-cornered way. That is why I insist that Miss Sorsby be kept out of it—since she was not in it from the beginning—and if you wish to discuss this further, it must be done personally between you and me.

This, then, is the business side of the matter. Now I’d like to take a little time on the personal side of it—because I think I can make it clearer to you in a letter than in conversation. You will have time to consider it without hurry and form your own opinion.

I want to repeat here once more that any criticism I might make of anyone in your office does not constitute a criticism of you personally. I think that your attitude on this point lies at the root of all our troubles. You have never done this before—and for many years our relations have been more than merely those of author-and-agent; we have been very good friends and we have had no trouble of any kind. But now you seem to have taken the position that’s best described by the old saying of “love me—love my dog.” I don’t mean this in any insulting manner, but I think you understand what this saying implies. You seem to have taken it as a personal insult to you or as lack of confidence in you if I criticized anyone in your office. And yet you know that no executive, however able, can always be right in the selection of his associates. The best and wisest make mistakes some times and to admit it is no detriment to you in any manner. But whenever I mentioned specific things which Miss Sorsby had done and of which I didn’t approve, you did not even do me the justice and courtesy of investigating the case on its merits and accepting my views or pointing out to me my error. Instead, you simply showed such bitter resentment, almost hatred, that I had no choice left but to leave you. This was one of the main reasons. Do you wish an example? I asked you whose idea it was to send the script of my play to Lionel Stander. You said it was your own—and you were very angry at me for asking. When, over the telephone, I asked the same question of Miss Sorsby, she said it had been her idea—as, of course, I had known all along. I have too much respect for your literary judgment to have believed that you would have done such a stupid thing. I have mentioned this submission to several experienced theatrical people. They laughed in my face. Now wouldn’t it have been fairer for you to investigate, ask other people in the theater and form your own opinion on whether such a submission had been wise or dignified? But you did not do this. You preferred to take my doubt of Miss Sorsby as an insult to you. That, of course, is your privilege. If you enjoy the thought that I have no confidence in you and have insulted you—you are free to think it. But if such a thought is not pleasant to you—and after the kind of relationship we have had for years, I don’t think that you can find it pleasant—then I want to say here that it is not so. I never doubted you personally or your intentions toward me. I do doubt Miss Sorsby’s efficiency. If you wish to make it one—well, I can’t help it. But I don’t accept it in this way.

To finish with the subject of Miss Sorsby, I want to say also that I have nothing against her as a person—since I do not know anything about her. I am willing to believe that she is honestly doing the best she can. But I do know that she is totally inexperienced as a literary agent. I suspect that she has never sold a single play. This does not mean that she may not become an excellent agent eventually. But it does mean that she needs practice and experience—like a beginner in any line, no matter what latent ability she might possess. And I am not in a position to be the guinea-pig in the case. Particularly since Miss Sorsby has shown no desire to understand my view-point or even to inquire about it during the time that the play was in your office. Granting that she has to learn the business—how will she ever learn it if your clients are not allowed to point out her mistakes? If you do not wish to see mistakes corrected and only resent the client for complaining? Do you see how unfair this is—both to the client and to Miss Sorsby herself?

I don’t know whether this has become your attitude towards all your clients or only towards me. I simply don’t know what to think of your attitude toward me for the last year. The change in you began since the failure of The Unconquered. I don’t think that that was the reason. But I think it started something in your mind against me—doubt, weariness, or what—I don’t know. It became worse when I worked in the Willkie Campaign. I tried to take the American attitude that each man is entitled to his own opinions, and that our political differences have nothing to do with our relations. You know that politics are an important issue to me, but I never felt any resentment against your political viewpoint and, in all honesty, I know that I never gave you cause to believe I felt such resentment. But I felt resentment in your attitude toward me, a bitter, quiet sort of resentment. Whether it was because I supported Willkie or whether there were other reasons—I don’t know. I noticed only that the question of Willkie was always brought up by you and always bitterly or sarcastically. I didn’t know what to think. I spent a year making my own apologies for some of the things you said to me. I kept saying to myself that you didn’t mean it the way it sounded—and what did it have to do with our relations and with business? And then the time came when I couldn’t do it any longer—and so I had to leave. I still don’t understand what exactly happened between us.

But I think that something has happened in your own life, something that has made you very unhappy—and it has changed your whole attitude toward things and people. I don’t know what it is. I know only that if it were I who had disappointed you in some manner—you would have told me so frankly. You would have had facts and reasons and stated them to me and given me a chance to explain and listened to my explanations. But you never did. In fact, the thing that was hardest for me was that I noticed your desire to avoid any serious conversation with me. Instead, you really tried to go on and do your best for me—with the most frightening sort of resentment growing in you against me. I believe in all sincerity that you honestly tried. I even think that you didn’t want to show the resentment and tried to hide it. But I felt it. More and more every time I saw you. That’s what made it so baffling for me. I still ask: Why? An instinct? What instinct, Ann? Even instincts have reasons behind them.

You know, Ann, business is business, but aren’t there other things besides that are important in life also? You have many clients who bring you more money than I did, but you’ve never had one who was as devoted to you, who had the complete, enthusiastic, personal faith in you that I had. You know the kind of earnest person I am. And you were something serious to me, serious and important besides any questions of business. One doesn’t find that sort of feeling often in life—nor a person for whom one can feel it. I know you wouldn’t want to destroy that—just like that, without any reason. There must be a reason. What was it? To me—this is a funeral. The funeral of a person who meant a great deal to me. I am really writing this to the Ann Watkins I met five years ago. I think she would have wanted to understand. And, perhaps, you still care to understand. I even admit the possibility that you might feel exactly the same way about me—that it was I who let you down. But if so—why don’t you say it? Why don’t you explain it—for your own sake, if not for mine? Do you really think that one should end a relationship such as ours with a reference to an “instinct”—and nothing else?

Now, to come back to your letter, your saying that I “regard this office in the light of dirty kikes or reds” is just another little example of the whole situation. Wouldn’t it have been fairer to ask me about my side of the conversation with Miss Sorsby before you made conclusions and quotations? I did not refer to your office as “kikes” or “reds.” I merely told Miss Sorsby the story of our old friend Satenstein and told her what I thought of agents who tried to get unearned commissions. Which is what she was trying to do—on the old Satenstein technique of “your word against mine.” If she represents the attitude of your office—then you make the definition, not I. but I still don’t think that she does. It was not your attitude when I saw you last. That is why I don’t even consider your last letter as coming from you. I think you let her talk you into it—without taking the time to think it out. You state that you wrote me another letter, but changed your mind after you spoke to her. That, Ann, is the whole story. You have never acted like a Satenstein type of agent before. Why do you want to let someone else try to do it in your name? If you are not clear on the situation, why not investigate—yourself and in person?

You close your letter by saying that you regret there should be in the end repeated misunderstandings between us. That is exactly my own feeling. If you really mean it, if you do regret misunderstandings—please let us clear them up. I am more than willing. But any problem can be cleared up only in person, directly and on the basis of facts. If you wish to tell me your reasons for your changed attitude toward me—I’ll be more than willing to listen. But it must be a sincere conversation, Ann. Without resentment, without generalities and without “instincts.” What do any of us know about instincts? What do they mean? What do they prove? Only language can be a means of communication between people and a means of understanding. Words, thoughts, reasons. If we drop them—we will have nothing but misunderstandings left. If we want to face things honestly and reasonably, we can still end up as friends, and I think we both deserve that much—after the years we have behind us.

Sincerely,

P.S. I am sending a copy of this letter to Margot—because she has been extremely nice to me and I want her to know the reasons for my leaving.

Editorial Postscript: The Ayn Rand Archives contains no written response from Ann Watkins. However, her agency continued to handle Night of January 16th and the foreign rights to The Fountainhead, though Rand’s particular agents were people other than Watkins. Rand’s daily calendars contain several entries for phone calls or meetings with Ann Watkins from 1943 to 1948.

To Dr. Vera Guzarchik Glarner, Ayn Rand’s first cousin, who left Russia before the war and was living in Switzerland

The letter below is a translation of a draft handwritten by Ayn Rand in Russian and was translated by Dina Schein Federman. Mrs. Glarner answered Rand’s final version on December 21, 1945.

December 2, 1945

Dear Vera:

I am writing to find out where you are and how you are. I hope very much that you have survived the war without too much awful suffering and that this letter will reach you.

Do you need help? Money or medicines or food? My acquaintances here send packages with food to their friends in Europe. I know that the situation over there is terrible. Write me whether I could help you. I would be very happy to help in any way I can—and this will not be difficult for me to do now.

I will not write details about myself, for I do not know whether you will receive this letter. I will say only that I am doing very well. I am now a famous writer here and, after many years, I have achieved everything that I wished to achieve.

I haven’t had a word from our family in Russia since 1938. If you know something about them, do not write me about it now. I am afraid to know and do not wish to ask questions. I am waiting for the day when it would be possible to learn something from Russia with certainty—and to send them aid. I am afraid to hear something that would be impossible to ascertain and about which I would not be able to do anything.

Please write me about yourself and tell me whether I could help you.

Kisses.

To Senator Joseph McCarthy, the controversial senator who headed investigations into Communist influence in America

This letter was written eight days after Ayn Rand penned (but possibly did not send) the following note to Sen. McCarthy: “Congratulations on your support of Dr. J. B. Matthews. Please do not permit an expert enemy of Communism to be penalized for fighting Communism.” There is no evidence of any letter from McCarthy to Miss Rand.

July 12, 1953

Dear Senator McCarthy:

I have been an admirer and supporter of your fight against Communism for many years. I have argued in your defense every time I heard anyone attack you in my presence, and, in spite of the tremendous smear campaign against you, I have always won every argument, because truth, fact and logic were on your side. Now, regretfully, I will not be able to consider myself your supporter nor to defend you any longer. I think that you might want to know my reasons, so I will state them here, because I believe that this, in essence, will be the attitude of all of your sincere followers, though they may not be able to give a coherent expression to their feelings.

I am shocked and stunned by your betrayal of J. B. Matthews. By dismissing him from his post, you have accomplished what the Daily Worker and all the pinks or semi-pinks have not been able to accomplish, namely: you have publicly branded Dr. Matthews as an irresponsible demagogue whose investigations of Communism are not to be trusted.

Yet you know, and we all know, by this public record, that Dr. Matthews is the most thorough, reliable and conscientious investigator of Communism known to the public in this country. By your action you have disarmed and discredited him, and you have invalidated all of his past or future activities. From now on, if Dr. Matthews attempts, as a private citizen, to fight against Communism, the whole force of the Leftists will be unleashed against him in a single smear-phrase: “He’s the man whom even Senator McCarthy had to fire as unreliable!”

A few months from now, the details of the issue will be forgotten, Dr. Matthews’ article will be forgotten, the average man will have no way to check on the truth or falsity of the charge—but the above smear will remain and stick, because it is fact. You did dismiss Dr. Matthews for his attack against Communism. This is the kind of burden you have placed upon one of your best supporters and fighters.

The liberals have been accusing you of “character assassination” and smear tactics. These charges have not damaged you in the eyes of the voters, because these charges were not true. Ironically enough, the Matthews case is the first time that you have committed an act of “character assassination” in the exact sense of the liberals’ charges: you have destroyed a man’s reputation, without inquiry, hearing or regard for the truth or falsity of the attack against him—and you have perpetrated this injustice, not against a Leftist, but against one of your best conservatives, not for the crime of supporting the Communists, but for the crime of attacking them.

You have set a precedent which makes any exposé of Communism, by private writers or by your own Committee, impossible in the future. You have accepted the principle that an attack upon individual members of a profession is an attack upon the profession as a whole. On this basis, any pro-Communist whom anyone exposes in the future will be justified in rallying to his support the whole profession to which he belongs. If he is a writer or a plumber, he will be able to convince the public that an attack on him is an attack upon all writers or plumbers. He will lean on the authority, not of Earl Browder or Alger Hiss, but on the authority of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy. How, then, do you expect any anti-Communist to be able to continue the fight?

The only question in this whole issue is: Was Dr. Matthews’ article true or false? You have given him no hearing. You have not proved that his article was false or unwarranted. Therefore, the only conclusion one can draw from your action is this: you have dismissed a fighter against Communism because he has attacked persons too powerful to challenge.

What value, meaning, sense or dignity is there left in your fight after this? What honest investigator would care to work for you—once it is made clear that he may investigate only those whom it is safe to expose, but will be broken and betrayed the moment he exposes something truly damaging to the Communists? What confidence can we, the voters, have in any future exposé undertaken by your Committee—when it looks as if you are apparently free to fight only by the consent and permission of the very enemy whom you are fighting—when it looks as if you will be permitted to play at small skirmishes, but will be stopped the moment you attack any truly vulnerable spot? If this is your position, then your fight will not merely be ineffectual, but will actively help the enemy. Your fight will become a screen for the enemy. It will give the country the impression that Communists are being watched and exposed, while, in fact, a few office boys will be exposed, but the tops will be left safely free to function. If this is your position, then your fight will encourage the appeasers, compromisers and “middle-of-the-roaders,” but will destroy any anti-Communist when and if he becomes effective enough to be dangerous to Communism. If this is your position, then your fight will penalize your own soldiers for being too good. What sort of army do you expect to have under these conditions?

Most regretfully, perhaps more sadly than at any other disappointment I have ever suffered in a public figure, I must say that from now on I will not be able to trust any action undertaken by your Committee. No matter whom or what you expose, I will have no way of knowing whether you have really exposed the tops or merely made a deal with the enemy to expose a few inconsequential underlings. I will have no way to defend your actions against those who will doubt or smear you. There is no way to defend a crusader who is a compromiser.

The only solution that I can see for your present position would be for you to reinstate Dr. Matthews in his post, now that you have the power to hire whom you please, and to air the whole issue of his article in full detail, at a public hearing before your own Committee or in any other manner you may find proper. But in a manner which would give it publicity equal to the publicity given to Dr. Matthews’ undeserved disgrace. The only way to serve justice is by facts—by proving publicly that Dr. Matthews’ article was not a smear attack upon anyone. And, above all, you must prove that an anti-Communist will be given at least half the consideration, caution, courtesy and chance to clear his name that is being given to every lousy pro-Communist. This is the least you can do now to redeem the prestige of your own name, your Committee and your cause. Any other course will merely be your political suicide.

I am enclosing a cartoon from today’s New York Times to prove my contention. This is what you have done to one of your most honorable supporters. If this is allowed to stand, you cannot expect to have any supporters any longer.

To Justice Emery

Ayn Rand’s letter below was in response to a December 10, 1963, handwritten letter from a “Justice Emery.” In that letter, Emery requested “an authentic autographed picture of you” for his grandson, thus fulfilling his grandson’s “dying wish.”

December 28, 1963

Dear Justice Emery:

Thank you for your letter and your Christmas greeting. Please accept my deepest sympathy for your tragic situation.

I don’t know your grandson, but since he likes my work, I feel a bond between us, and I must tell you frankly that what I feel is heartbreaking. This makes me able to understand and share your feeling, at least to some small extent

I am enclosing the photograph for your grandson. The quotation on it is from Atlas Shrugged.

Does your grandson know the truth about his condition? If he does, please tell him that I would like to help him bear it and to give him encouragement, in any way I can. In any case, give him my warmest personal wishes.

And, if I may ask you to, please let me know that happens.

With profound sympathy,

Editorial Postscript: Research on the Web indicates that “Justice Emery” was a pseudonym for Marshall Emery Bean, an autograph dealer who sent similar requests to many famous authors in order to obtain autographed books to sell. Miss Rand was far from the only victim of this scam who honored Emery’s request; “gifts” to Bean from other victims can often be purchased from autograph and used-book dealers. There is no evidence that “Justice Emery” responded to Rand’s letter.

Letters to the clergy

The following two letters to clergymen are printed consecutively in order to show Ayn Rand’s changed attitude toward religion. The first is to a reverend, whose letter to Rand is not in the Ayn Rand Archives (nor is any response or book review). The second, which was previously published in Letters of Ayn Rand, is to a Swiss Catholic clergyman who asked that he remain anonymous.

October 23, 1943

Dear Reverend Dudley,

Thank you for your very interesting letter. Unfortunately, you mailed it to the printers, not the publishers, of my book, so I did not receive it until today. I hope this will reach you in time for your lecture.

You asked for information on my background. I am a Russian woman by birth, but an American citizen now. I came to this country in 1926. My first novel was We the Living, published by Macmillan in 1936. I worked on The Fountainhead for seven years. I wrote it as my tribute to America and to the American spirit.

Now as to your most interesting philosophical questions. You wonder “what are we going to do with the two billion people that populate the earth in the light of my thesis.” The only thing to do with them is to do nothing. The only thing good we can do to mankind is to leave it alone, which means to leave it free. Men do have the capacity to work out their own destiny, and nobody else can work it out for them, and the only obstacle that stops them and destroys them is the interference of other men. All tyrannies have originated, not for an evil, but for an altruistic purpose—the desire “to do something” with mankind. When men recognize that doing things for and with others is improper and immoral and can lead only to the most vicious consequences—most of mankind’s problem will be solved.

America, as it used to be, in the form and principles established by her Constitution, has shown the proper manner of living for all mankind. Individual freedom and unalienable individual rights, independence of individual action and choice, no “planning” or “directives” of any “social aims” whatever—that is the whole formula for human decency and happiness. American has shown that it worked and how magnificently it worked. The rest of the world has America’s example. They can follow it, if they wish. If they do not wish, there’s nothing we can do for them. One cannot force men—or nations—to live as human beings if they prefer to be swine in a collectivist pig pen.

I do not believe that science and machines are producing what you so aptly call “mass-mindedness,” which then influences politics, economics and social relationships. That would be a materialistic, Marxist explanation. It is men’s thinking that determines the course of events—and our thinking has been growing progressively collectivist for over a century. The revolting intellectual mess in which the world finds itself now is the ultimate result, the end of the blind alley of philosophical collectivism. Parasites have always existed, but they were of no danger to mankind until the better men, the thinkers and producers, began to preach the doctrine of the parasite—collectivism and altruism. What we need now to save the world is a rebirth of the principles of individualism.

I was very much interested in your question on the relation of the ego to the “supreme ego.” I believe that my statement of man’s proper morality does not contradict any religious belief, if that belief includes faith in man’s free will. My morality is based on man’s nature, on the fundamental attribute of his nature which distinguishes him from the animals—his rational faculty. Since man is a rational being, his morality must be individualistic, for the mind is an attribute of the individual and there is no collective brain. If it is said that man is created by God, endowed with an immortal soul, and with reason as an attribute of his soul, it still holds true that he must act in accordance with his nature, the nature God gave him, and that in doing so he will be doing God’s will. But this implies that God endowed man with free will and the capacity of choice. It will not hold with a belief in a God as a deterministic ruler. But such a belief makes all morality impossible. Morality and determinism are mutually exclusive by definition. If there is a cosmic destiny, its meaning is man’s freedom. If, however, we assume a cosmic destiny working out some purpose of its own which man cannot change or influence—then man is not free; then he can only act as prescribed and, if so, cannot be held responsible for his actions, nor considered either moral or immoral. But this is a belief which no truly religious person would accept. A benevolent God would not create a universe of slaves.

Christianity was the first school of thought that proclaimed the supreme sacredness of the individual. The first duty of a Christian is the salvation of his own soul. This duty comes above any he may owe to his brothers. This is the basic statement of true individualism. The salvation of one’s own soul means the preservation of the integrity of one’s ego. The soul is the ego. Thus Christianity did preach egoism in my sense of the word, in a high, noble and spiritual sense. Christ did say that you must love your neighbor as yourself, but He never said that you must love your neighbor better than yourself—which is the monstrous doctrine of altruism and collectivism. Altruism—the demand of self-immolation for others—contradicts the basic premise of Christianity, the sacredness of one’s own soul. Altruism introduced a basic contradiction into Christian philosophy, which has never been resolved. The entire history of Christianity in Europe has been a continuous civil war, not merely in fact, but also in spirit. I believe that Christianity will not regain its power as a vital spiritual force until it has resolved this contradiction. And since it cannot reject the conception of the paramount sacredness of the individual soul—this conception holds the root, the meaning and the greatness of Christianity—it must reject the morality of altruism. It must teach man neither to serve others nor to rule others, but to live together as independent equals, which is the only possible state of true brotherhood. Brothers are not mutual servants nor mutual dependents. Only slaves are. Dependence breeds hatred. Only free men can afford to be benevolent. Only free men can love and respect one another. But a free man is an independent man. And an independent man is one who lives primarily for himself.

I had better stop now, for I could discuss this subject forever, and I am glad of my first opportunity to discuss it with a minister. Of course, I did not intend all this for use in your review of my book—but you may use any part of it that suits your purpose.

I am very grateful for your interest in “The Fountainhead,” and I appreciate profoundly the desire you expressed to give it a larger audience.

Sincerely,

***

March 20, 1965

Dear Father______:

Thank you for your letter. No, I have no desire to “tear it up in disgust” nor to “have a good laugh at an enemy.” I found it profoundly interesting and I sincerely appreciate it.

Yes, I was “startled at a clergyman talking like that,” but I cannot say that I would have considered it impossible. I have often thought that since religion is the only field seriously concerned with morality, a religious philosopher should or could be interested in the philosophy of Atlas Shrugged. Rather than regard you as an “enemy,” I would like to think of you as an honorable adversary. After many disappointments in this regard, I am not certain that such an adversary can exist, but I will assume it as a hypothesis and will answer you on that assumption.

I see that some aspect of my writing appeals to you, but you have not indicated specifically what it is that you do agree with. You indicate that you disagree on the issue of atheism. I do not understand your position on this subject. You write that, according to your concept, God is “the Depth, the Source, the Force, the Love of life.” These are metaphorical expressions; I do not know what they mean in this context. You say: “It simply is so, because Life is not a blind force and no contradictions.” This is an arbitrary assertion on your part. Life is neither a “blind force” nor a supernatural one; it is a natural fact, which exists and requires no supernatural explanation.

You write: “Am I going to prove my point? Can you prove that contradictions do not exist?” I will refer you to Aristotle’s definition of an axiom and to Galt’s statement in Atlas Shrugged in reference to axioms: “An axiom is a proposition that defeats its opponents by the fact that they have to accept it and use it in the process of any attempt to deny it.” The Law of Identity is an axiom; so is the Law of Contradiction. The concept of proof presupposes the existence of axioms by which one proves the truth of one’s statements; the demand that one “prove” the laws of logic is a contradiction in terms. But the concept of God is not an axiom.

Your interpretation of the concept of God as “powerless on earth” is highly original, but it is a personal interpretation, which does not validate the concept in question and cannot be taken as a fact of reality.

In regard to the meaning of the crucifixion, you must certainly know that your interpretation is not the generally accepted one. There are many interpretations of that meaning, but the prevalent one is that Christ died on the cross as a sacrifice to redeem man from Original Sin. That is the idea I was answering in the Playboy interview.

I was astonished by your statement that my answer to Playboy was not straightforward, with the implication that I softened the issue in order not to shock the public. Such an implication is unworthy of you. You refer to my courage and seem to understand that courage was required to formulate my philosophy and to publish what I have published. If so, then isn’t it somewhat preposterous to suspect me of being afraid to speak openly in, of all things, a popular magazine?

I was not “taken aback” by the question about the sign of the cross. It is a question I have discussed many times. What I did object to was the interviewer’s way of presenting the issue in such superficial terms. I considered it offensive on the ground of respect both for my philosophy and for religion. The issue is too serious to hide behind symbolism. A discussion in terms of mere symbols can lead to nothing but misinterpretation and confusion. Since both the sign of the dollar and the sign of the cross are symbols, it is the ideas they symbolize that had to be discussed openly and explicitly. It is the notion of sacrificing the best to the worst, of the ideal to the non-ideal, that was essential in this context, and that I discussed. I call your attention to my concluding answer on this issue: “If I had to choose between faith and reason, I wouldn’t consider the choice even conceivable. As a human being, one chooses reason.” Do you regard this as a “softening” touch?

No, I have no desire to “replace the sign of the cross with the sign of the dollar.” The sign of the dollar is a symbol introduced by me in fiction to symbolize the cause of the particular group of men in my story. It would be improper to introduce a symbol for philosophy in real life, though it is quite appropriate in fiction. Philosophy does not deal in symbols and does not require them.

Perhaps I should add that I am an intransigent atheist, but not a militant one. This means that I am an uncompromising advocate of reason and that I am fighting for reason, not against religion. I must also mention that I do respect religion in its philosophical aspects, in the sense that it represents an early form of philosophy.

I have the impression that you are a follower of Thomas Aquinas, whose position, in essence, is that since reason is a gift of God, man must use it. I regard this as the best of all the attempts to reconcile reason and religion—but it is only an attempt, which cannot succeed. It may work in a limited way in a given individual’s life, but it cannot be validated philosophically. However, I regard Aquinas as the greatest philosopher next to Aristotle, in the purely philosophical, not theological, aspects of his work. If you are a Thomist, we may have a great deal in common, but we would still have an irreconcilable basic conflict which is, primarily, an epistemological conflict.

No, I will not publish your letter, and if I show it to anyone, I will be very careful to omit your name. I sympathize fully with your desire not “to be hurt by fools more than necessary.”

With my sincere appreciation.

About Michael Berliner

Michael Berliner is the founding executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, served as cochairman of ARI’s board of directors, and is currently senior adviser to the Ayn Rand Archives. He is editor of Letters of Ayn Rand and Understanding Objectivism and taught philosophy and philosophy of education for many years at California State University, Northridge.

View all articles by Michael Berliner →